Sunday, July 14, 2013

Björn Brändewall: "Based on a 1989 ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union,
and on article 19, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European
Union, 'No one may be removed, expelled or extradited to a State where
there is a serious risk that he or she would be subjected to the death
penalty, torture or other inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment'"

Björn Brändewall: “Based on a 1989 ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union,
and on article 19, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European
Union, ‘No one may be removed, expelled or extradited to a State where
there is a serious risk that he or she would be subjected to the death
penalty, torture or other inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment’ “

Mr Björn Brändewall is a MP candidate of
the Swedish Liberal Party (Folkpartiet), currently member of the leading
board of the Liberal Party in the “Kalmar Län”, Sweden [Coat of arms of the Kalmar Län at left. Län are the first level administrative and political subdivisions of Sweden, equivalent to “region” in Italy or the “state” in the U.S.]. The Swedish Liberal Party (Liberal People’s Party of Sweden, in Swedish Folkpartiet liberalerna,
FP) forms part of the center-right coalition of the current government
of Sweden. It is the second largest party in the government coalition.

The
Swedish Liberal Party at Kalmar sent recently a request to the national
leadership of the said party, to consider the asylum for Mr Edward
Snowden. The missive was signed by the Chairman of the Swedish Liberal
Party in Kalmar, Mr Börje Helgesson [picture down at right]. Mr
Helgesson, together with Mr Brändewall [picture down-left], also
wrote an opinion article in Barometern headed “Liberal Party wants to give asylum to Snowden“.

Declarations of the initiative’s authors have been published in the official site of the Liberal Party of Sweden; the text is visualized in the screenshot, down below this text.

For instance, Mr Brändewall declares,
“Edward Snowden fears for his life. He does not regret anything, but he
he knows what he can expect if the U.S. [authorities] manage to get hold
of him. His only crime was to tell the American people what their
government is up to. For that he has not only given up his career, but
he is also risking his life”.

Brändewall
continues, “In the information age, information is power. For
individuals to have power over their lives, they must also have power
over their information. However, our worst fears of a surveillance
society have become true, and others end up with that power”, says Björn
Brändewall.

For
his part, the Chairrman of the Kalmar Liberals Börje Helgesson states
that “the Swedish Liberal Party has been engaged during many years to
make Sweden a refuge for persecuted authors working in countries with
restricted freedom of expression”. He also hopes that their proposal of
asylum for Mr Snowden will be treated at government level.

Professors blogg’s questions to Mr Brändewall

I asked Mr Brändewall for an interview in Professors blogg, which he kindly accepted. Here below his answers.

Professors blogg:Thinking
that an indictment against Mr Snowden might comprise the possibility of
death penalty, what kind of reassurances do you think it could be
obtained from
the authorities (Government or Immigration authorities) on that Snowden
will not be send to the US in case his extradition is requested?

Björn Brändewall: “Based on a 1989 ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union,
and on article 19, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European
Union, ‘No one may be removed, expelled or extradited to a State where
there is a serious risk that he or she would be subjected to the death
penalty, torture or other inhuman or degrading treatment or
punishment’.”

He continues, “This strongly appears to
be the case with Snowden and the USA. It should be noted that Sweden has
failed to live up to this before, when the Social Democratic government
at the request of CIA turned over two Egyptian citizens to Egypt in
2001, where they were tortured. However, this became a big scandal, and
the current centre-right government in Sweden ought to be hard pressed
not to repeat the mistake of their old rival, the Social Democrats.”

Professors blogg:
What level of response (mainly positive or mainly negative?), has your
proposal have got among your peers in the Liberal Party or among the
young liberals?

Björn Brändewall:
“Responses from Liberal Party peers have so far been fairly sparse, but
what we have received has been mainly positive. I realize that when it
comes to issues that affect diplomatic relations, people in high power
may have many reasons not to give public statements too quickly. Still, I
hope the media attention that our proposal has gathered will speed this
up.”

Professors blogg:
Has the Liberal Party’s national leadership already scheduled the
discussion of the proposal done by the Liberals at Kalmar Region?

Björn Brändewall: “Not
that we know of. We at the Liberal Party in the Kalmar Region
[Folkpartiet Kalmar län] intend to follow-up on this though, as we feel
this matter needs to be handled urgently.”

On other issues – contained in an addenda to this interview Mr Björn Brändewall sent to Professors blogg – Mr Brändewall also expressed his concern about an eventually magnified focus on the person
of Snowden. That might shadow, according to his opinion, the real
issues at stake as revealed “in the news about the NSA surveillance”. In
his words:

”I am concerned that the media are
devoting so much focus on Edward Snowden personally. Snowden’s fate will
be decided sooner or later, and when that happens I am afraid that news
will die out, including the news of the NSA surveillance. We need to
shift the debate to be more about NSA and PRISM, and American
politicians, so they don’t get away with this.”

x

——

Advocating in benefit of a Swedish asylum
for whistleblower Edward Snowden, it is a human-rights goal that Mr
Björn Brändewall, Mr Börje Helgesson and Professors blogg share sincerely. I.e., Why Sweden should consider asylum to Edward Snowden, by Marcello Ferrada-Noli.

Professors blogg also struggle for the
human-rights of all whistleblowers risking their lives, including the
right to asylum for Mr Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks

That means: You are free to copy, distribute, display, the above-referred materials, under the following conditions

Attribution. You must attribute the work (full text, text excerpts, or artwork as indicated above) in this specified manner: Author’s name and hyperlink of the article or artwork in the Professors blog

Any of these conditions may be waived by seeking permission from Professors blogg. For contact email fdenoli@gmail.com